The Choice
by GoddessofSnark
Summary: Magenta has a tough choice to make.......


A/N Just a little thing that I had started writing in a cemetery (they're very inspirational), some of the lines near the end were modified out of Ever After...hehe! ENJOY!  
  
I sat on the cold stone bench. I found this place to be a wonderful area to think. It was so calm, so peaceful. The distant roar of traffic was just that-distant. The only sounds were the whisper of the cold wind and the slight crunch of leaves blowing into trees. And other than the leaves billowing around me, all was still.  
  
The peaceful aurora enveloped me and I felt my mind slipping away. I stared out, past the gravel path, past the endless rows of white, past the distant treeline, and found myself staring that day in the face. I had always hated that day. It was one of the worst days of my life.  
  
It had started off like any normal day. It had been one of the same, slow- moving, boring days that I had grown to love, grown to expect. I had been puttering around the house, doing all the mindless things that didn't have to be done, but I had nothing better to do, I was doing them. I had just finished reorganizing the sock drawer when the boy came in.  
  
I could sense that something was wrong. Just the look that the boy had on his face. It was a somber look, a sober look. A look I had seen too many times. My face paled in shock. My heart beat faster and faster, and I felt dizzy. It couldn't be. The look was meant for someone else. The look was to tell me he'd be late. The look wasn't what I thought it was. But my thoughts were just way to put off the truth.  
  
The boy seemed to sense that I knew why he was there. "I'm sorry." He said softly, and I gave him a look that seemed to tell him to get out, while a small sob racked my body. He gave me a sympathetic look, bowed his head, and left, closing the door quietly behind him.  
  
I was in shock. I moped around for the next few days, sullen, depressed. I barely left the bedroom, afraid of the memories I would be confronted with. How could he, a man that had stared danger in the face so many times, be dead? Much less by an accident, during a drill that had been practiced so many times before?  
  
The thought of him could send me over the edge sometimes. It felt so empty without him. But everyone in the castle pitied me, everyone offered there sympathy. Everyone but DeLordy. And now, now DeLordy had given me a choice. A choice, that perhaps, would be the hardest decision of my life.  
  
Go with him, marry him, be stuck with him for the rest of my life, or die. A hard choice indeed. I hated the slimy git with all of my being, but we had worked so hard to come back here, come back to Transexual, that I didn't want all of our efforts to be in vain. Oh, especially not all that Riff had done to get us to come back.  
  
The only reason why I would live would to be a testimony to all that Riff had done. To be able to tell of how we had overcome everything. Overcome everything but death. Death was the only thing that had beaten us. My eyes focused down a little lower, at one of the many many rows of tombstones.  
  
There was one, which stood out. It was whiter than the others, brighter, larger. It had been beautifully designed and engraved, and had cost a fourtune. But since he had been working for the castle, and had died a death as he had, I had to pay next to nothing for it. But I would have given anything just to see him happy. Just to give him whatever he wanted.  
  
I gently walked up to it, and ran my hand across the smooth top. I felt a single tear fall from my eye as I thought of him. As I thought of how he would comfort me if he was there, and saw me crying. I thought of his gentle embrace, so different from how he was on the battlefield. So different from the façade that he put up.  
  
I wanted nothing more than to dig through the earth, to where his coffin lay, and join him, feel his arms around me one last time. But I wouldn't. but I refused to give into DeLordy as well. I couldn't decide what to do. But those next few minutes clinched it. It was in those next few minutes that I decided on what I was going to do.  
  
DeLordy came up behind me, and wrapped his arm around my waist. It wasn't the loving gesture that Riff had used, but rather one that seemed to say that I would soon be a possession of his. I twisted away from him. "Come now Magenta. Don't dwell on him. Don't dwell on his..untimely death." I gasped as my face paled. He laughed at this. That bastard! "Did you really belive that he'd died in an accident? The poor public could, but I thought you were smarter than that." I tensed.  
  
He'd killed him. that pitiful excuse for a man had killed the only man that had ever meant anything to me. I stared at him. I now hated him with all of my being. I hated everything to do with him. but I couldn't do anything about it. I was too shocked at his revelation. He laughed again. He had killed Riff and was laughing about it. That was the last straw, the next thing I knew, I had slapped him.  
  
He was stunned. He didn't know what to do. He raised his flabby hand up to his red cheek. A look of pure anger crossed his face, and he moved back towards me. "Ah, such attitude. But you're mine now." A look of disgust crossed my face. I wasn't his. I would never be his. I was Riff's, and Riff's alone.  
  
"I'd rather die than be yours. You're a filthy cold-blooded murderer." I said, mustering up all the courage I could to speak up to him. His eyes flashed fire and ice.  
  
"We'll see about that. You just need a little...persuading." he was back behind me, running his hands through my hair. I took a deep breath. My heart was pounding in my chest. I wanted to scream. I wanted to kill him, to have him die a horrible death, to avenge what he had done to Riff. I walked off, with him huffing and puffing at my heels.  
  
"You can't run. You're mine." He said, forcibly turning me around. My lips contorted into a snarl.  
  
"I'm not yours, you gave me a choice." I reminded him.  
  
"And to think, you'd rather die than have wealth and power."  
  
"I would rather die than be forced to live with the man who murdered the man that I loved." He was angry again.  
  
"Fine then. Have it your way." He said, producing a laser. I stood there, shocked. I didn't want to die, but I didn't want to be forced with him. as I stared at him, the cold cruel man he was, I realized that this was the better choice. Was this the same way that he had killed Riff? I wouldn't know. But I do know that as those three beams of light came at me, that I was glad that I would see Riff again, and that I could curl up in his protective arms for all of eternity. 


End file.
